


Expensive Mistake

by venueska



Category: Love Island (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Arguing, Bobby Takes the Money, Break Up, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:35:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24499531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/venueska/pseuds/venueska
Summary: (Requested by Anon and Presley [@bobbymckenziess]) A love you had thought was sacred has turned sour, and you hadn’t even been granted the luxury of having your heart broken in private.  AKA: Bobby takes the money in the finale.
Relationships: Bobby McKenzie & Main Character (Love Island)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 20





	Expensive Mistake

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bobbymckenziess](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bobbymckenziess/gifts).



> This emotionally exhausted me to write which is a good sign! I left my comfort zone (angst with fluffy undertones/happy endings) and I like how this turned out. 
> 
> Listen to: Getaway Car (Taylor Swift), Fool's Game (This Century), Don't Take the Money (Bleachers), My Friends Over You (New Found Glory), The Last Time (The Script), I Don't Love You (My Chemical Romance). I have a whole playlist but I don't know how to link those here.

“Thirty-two thousand pounds,” Bobby repeated, his face and voice deadpan. His sister winced, her face fresh with tears. His mum and dad dropped their gaze to the dining table. “We’ll never make that kind of money in a year. You should have told me earlier. I could have gotten a second job or something.”

The shop was going bankrupt. Elle’s student loans were piling up. Their bathroom sink hadn’t worked for years, the hole in the roof was becoming more than a nuisance now that the wood floors were growing brittle. Bobby looked around at his family’s faces, which were worn with wrinkles and exhaustion, and then back at himself. He’s spiffing, proud, and he smells of cookie dough. He scowls, already beginning to resent himself for buying these clothes and shoes all for the sake of fitting in with him work friends on a night out. 

“Bobby, we don’t expect you to fix this for us.” Rob McKenzie used to be a force to be reckoned with. He was full of light and life and hope and enough energy to power New York City. Now, he can’t meet his son’s eyes, on the verge of admitting his dreams had turned his once average life into a rotting nightmare. “We just wanted to make you aware that next Thanksgiving, well…” Rob shrugs dejectedly. “Dinner might not take place in this kitchen.”

“Don’t talk like that,” Bobby says. “I’ll figure something out, I swear it. Just give me a couple of days to confer with my friends and I’ll – “

“We can’t ask for charity, Bobs,” Elle cuts in, her expression pained. “That’s more blood on our hands. More debt. More loans.” She shakes her head.

“Not charity.” He rises from the table. “Just a second opinion. In order to get that kind of money we’d need to win the lottery or a game show or something. My friend Joey watches all types of game shows, so I’m going to ask him which one he thinks I have a shot at.” He walks over to his mum and presses a kiss to her head. “I promise you, I’ll figure something out.” 

Bobby casts a final weary look around the penniless McKenzie home. It’s then he realizes he’s prepared to do anything to fix it. 

~~~~~

Joey clicks his tongue as Bobby wraps up the extensive list of home improvements he needs to tend to. From the bankrupt shop to the student loans to the bathroom sink – Joey’s eyes grow as wide as saucers by the end of it all. 

“Right, then.” Joey brings a cigarette to his lips and ignites it, his eyes far faway in thought. “You need a cash prize of how much?”

“Thirty-two thousand pounds,” Bobby says. 

Joey whistles lowly. “Ouch. Any useful skills?”

Bobby just stares at him wordlessly.

“Come now, Bobs, you’re…” Joey pauses, his expression mirroring Bobby’s. He beams and claps his friend on the back. “Incredibly good looking. And charismatic! Girls love that.”

Bobby’s brows shoot up. “Girls? Joey, I’d make a terrible prostitute. We’ve established that.”

Joey flips his phone around to display the _Love Island_ Instagram page. 

“Love Island. Easy money.” Joey’s grin is proud and almost devilish. “All you need to do is find a girl, give her a smooch…” Joey smacks his lips together. “Golden ticket to fifty grand.”

“ _Fifty_ ,” Bobby echoes. “They give out fifty grand to you for… hitting it off?”

Joey taps his own nose and points at Bobby with a smirk. “Ah, that’s the catch. It’s fifty grand if you keep it for yourself. Twenty-five if you take the moral high road and split it with her.”

“That’s cold,” Bobby replies. Joey shrugs.

“Most times the girls are playing the game just as much as you are, Bobs.”

Bobby takes a moment to think about it. Finally, he gives his friend a decisive nod. “Okay, I’m listening. How do I sign up? Are there any extra qualifications?”

“You’ve got to be mighty fit,” Joey informs him. “Which, fortunately, is your specialty.”

“And?”

“That’s it.” 

Bobby frowns and gives Joey a gentle shove. Of course Joey meant no harm in implying Bobby was suited for the show because the only criteria he needed to meet was being naturally charming. But he can’t help but wish he had recommended something more personal. For a moment, his gratitude is overshadowed by this strange desire to be seen; to be _known_ – to be a part of a team.

“Bobby? Hey. Bruv.” Joey snaps his fingers in front of Bobby, jolting him out of his daydream. “The forms are 100% digital. I sent them to you. Good luck.” 

With a final teasing salute, Joey departs, leaving Bobby standing by himself with his phone in hand.

Briefly, his heart goes out to whatever poor girl he’s going to have to mug off for the show. He soothes his shame with Joey’s statement from before. Chances are, he’d wind up with someone playing the game just as much as him. It was a matter of outdoing her.

~~~~~

Standing out was the easy part. Reeling you in with his quick wit and oddball compliments didn’t take much effort. He had quickly established himself as the smooth talker, even if that meant taking the mickey out of the other blokes. What he hadn’t expected was for one of them to bite back without missing a beat, but it was all in good fun. Gary was growing to be Bobby’s favorite new friend in the Villa, because he made good efforts to keep Bobby humble.

You were outstanding in conversation, so he was far from bored, but he was finding it odd how quickly you had settled in with him. Word travels fast in the Villa, and it was easy to coax information out of Marisol if he played his cards right.

“She won’t let us forget that she’s loyal to you,” she says in a low voice. “It’s a bit odd if you ask me.”

Bobby, inordinately aware of the cameras and his reliance on the audience’s opinion of him, shrugged his shoulders and feigned a grin.

“Odd? It’s fantastic. I feel the same way.” He sips gingerly on his tea, evasive about further interrogation. If she presses the right buttons, she might see through his facade. He needs to play it cheeky, revealing just enough to make the audience soft for him because they feel they know him.

Without, of course, actually letting anyone know him.

A faint trace of his longing to be known ghosts against his skin. He brushes it off by drilling his family’s exhausted expressions into his brain, berating himself for allowing his selfish emotions to even almost be a factor.

~~~~~

“We’re always sparking off each other, she makes me laugh, and I’m fascinated by her,” Henrik was saying, an eager smile stretching ear-to-ear. It’s unclear at first who he’s eyeing. For the first time tonight, Bobby feels his throat dry up. “So, the girl I want to couple up with is MC.”

You stop chewing your lip to drop your jaw. Your eyes immediately dart over to Bobby, whose shocked expression is rivaled only by Gary’s.

Just like every other girl this evening, you’re not sure where to go. Your steps are careful and small, making your stride over to Henrik far from avid, casting Bobby a concerned expression. He’s gone pale.

It’s then that he starts to become vastly afraid of how deep his feelings for you might actually be.

~~~~~

Bobby had expected an event like Casa Amor to spring on them eventually.

What he hadn’t expected was for you to go against the specific instruction to leave the boys clueless and say goodbye to him. He’d mumbled some line about things being different without you, convinced it was an empty promise, only to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Six new girls arrived at the Villa just as Bobby wrapped up a breakfast spread too large for twelve people. 

At first, Bobby wrote off his distress as worry for the fact he might lose his shot at £50,000 now that he wasn’t safely coupled up with you. The added stress of you being at Casa Amor and potentially finding someone you fancied more than him (or someone who deserved you) was probably just scrambling his head. He kept trying to write off his own concerns, but the list was only growing.

He was hardly listening to the first two girls’ introductions and he really only bothered to commit the last two to memory because he figured he didn’t really need them.

 _Blake._ She had your accent. She sort of played up the morale a lot, which Bobby was shocked to find really transparent, but Henrik was falling for her hair flips fast and hard, which Bobby was trying desperately to turn a blind eye on. 

_Emily._ She loved French toast, she mentioned in passing to Jakub who seemed enchanted. Bobby subconsciously reserved a portion of his own French toast, searching absentmindedly for you in the room to hand it off to you.

“Here, it’s your favorite,” he says mildly to one of the new girls with bright red hair. She arches her brow at him.

“It’s _Emily’s_ favorite,” she reminds him. “I’m Natalia.”

Bobby frowns at her. “Sorry, you’re sitting where she usually sits.”

“Emily?” Natalia asks.

“MC,” Bobby replies. He waves away the conversation, leaving the French toast sticks untouched and retreating to the gym to rock amiably on the exercise balls.

Missing you wasn’t any effort he made to play up your realness as a poor little separated couple with odds against you - it was like second-nature or background noise in his brain. It might have gone completely unnoticed by him if he wasn’t questioned in the Beach Hut.

“What do you think of Siobhan?”

Bobby paused for a second too long. “Who?” he asks. “Oh! The tall one? She’s decent.”

Irritated, the producers press for more. “What’s the first thing you noticed about her?”

“She smells like MC.” Bobby says it more like a question. “I really haven’t spoken to her at all.”

“What about Blake?”

“Oh, she’s fit I suppose,” Bobby shrugs. “I had maybe one conversation with the girl. Erm, she… she’s got my favorite accent? Sort of chilled, but really intelligent-sounding, like MC’s, you know?”

Eyebrows raise behind the camera. An understanding lights up the producers’ faces, inspiring a question that turns Bobby’s cheeks engine red. “Do you miss MC?”

His face drops. “I do, actually.” A foreign honesty possesses him. “I didn’t think I would.”

~~~~~

The days where you girls were away at Casa Amor stagger on in a fashion horrifically similar to a snail’s pace. Bobby tried to put on a brave face. He woke up routinely every morning to prepare a massive breakfast. He would then spend far too much time cleaning the mess that follows, which Natalia points out in good nature.

“You act as if you’ve never cleaned a kitchen before,” she jokes. Bobby looks at her with wide eyes. “You’re a caterer.”

“No, I - “ He clears his throat, wringing out a dish rag. “I just like to be thorough.”

Natalia doesn’t buy it. She shoots him an amused smile and picks a mango out of the fruit bowl. “If you say so,” she says in a sing-song voice. “You really like her, don’t you?”

Bobby pretends her question doesn’t mortify him. “Who?”

“MC.” She cuts three perfect rings into the mango, raising her eyebrows at him.

“She’s alright,” Bobby says coolly, studying her face carefully as she digs into the mango with a metal spoon. “It’s early days though. We’re not even coupled up,” he reminds her.

“You wish you were though,” she says, pointing her spoon at him. “That’s how you know.”

“Know what exactly?”

Natalia rolls her eyes and shoots him a sarcastic expression. “You’re in love? I don’t know. You miss her at least.” 

He stops stalling in the kitchen, seeing as he’s no longer able to use it as an escape from the grafting and interrogation taking place all around the Villa. He retreats to the roof, gazing thoughtfully at the Spanish hills, trying hard not to let his thoughts swallow him up.

He wonders if there’s any way he can have both the dream of saving his family from poverty and the dream of having you to wake up to every morning, to press kisses into smiles, to make breakfast every morning, to watch walk down the aisle in a white dress. If he explains to you that his family is going to lose their house before they even get the chance to repair it, he’d be revealing not only to you but to every camera and every audience member that he’s here for the cash, possibly forfeiting it as a result, and publicly humiliating his parents.

He pauses. If that’s what he’s here for, he can’t let something as fickle and fading as emotion interfere with that. He has to do the right thing, even if it hurts to know he’s likely found the love of his life in here.

 _Snap out of it,_ he sneers at himself, shaking his head. _It’s been seventeen days. You haven’t even seen her for three of them._

But Natalia was right - it doesn’t matter that he hasn’t seen you in three days or that he wasn’t coupled up with you or that he didn’t come here to find love. If he was honest, he missed you terribly. 

Bobby looks over the hills one last time before his phone alerts him about a beach trip with the other girls. He sighs, slipping his phone into his pocket and pressing pause on the commotion evolving in his brain. 

~~~~~

Bobby shakes his arms out beside him, trying to calm his nerves about seeing you again. He tries not to let himself be afraid that you’ve switched to somebody else, trying to concentrate on looking for Marisol’s face around the fire pit.

“I hope you girls are ready to get hands-on,” Bobby calls out, swinging the door to the Villa open with a broad grin on his face. “Because the guy with the fastest hands in the Villa is single and he’s ready to mingle!”

Like an instinct, he meets your eye. His heart gives a delighted flutter in his chest when he realizes you’re not only sitting alone, but tearing up to see his decision as well.

“Single,” you say, your arms crossed over your chest to maintain a lighthearted mood, but your eyes still welling up with joy. “Am I a joke to you?”

He laughs, walking up to you and finding himself unsure of what to say. He finds it easy to crack jokes, to play it cool in front of all the cameras. But there were moments unforeseen where he was confronted with his real feelings, where his heart jumps up into his throat and catches his tongue before he can say anything smooth, forcing him to be honest.

“I missed you.”

Bobby’s eyes glitter with a childlike gleam and first-rate sincerity. At the sight of it, your knees threatened to buckle and your eyes threaten to pour out before your heart has the chance. You hold his face on both side with your hands and press a desperately overdue kiss to his lips. 

You pull apart for air and trace your thumb over his lips that are stained by your lipstick. “Meet me on the roof when this is over,” you say softly for just you two to hear.

His heart beats in his ear. He’s spent the entirety of Casa Amor trying to figure out how to be honest with you, when he should have been trying to figure out how to be honest with himself. 

Up on the roof, the air is irregularly thin. He feels as if he’s being suffocated by his own thoughts. You calm the storm by taking his hand, a patient smile on your face. There are tears in your eyes that won’t fall.

“I was a wreck waiting for you to come out,” you say. “I haven’t historically been the first choice for anyone.”

Bobby grins at you, pointing to his lips. “You kidding? I couldn’t get anyone to kiss these! You were written all over them.” He winks at you. It stings him just how truthful he’s being right now. “I meant what I said. No girl they throw at me can hold a candle to you.”

He feels a pang of guilt when he realizes he’s quoting a lie, even if it grew to be truer over time. He’s overcome with a new desire to treat you with the love he feels for you, even if it’s startling to him. The utter fear meshing with delirium in the pit of his stomach chases off all sensibility.

The walls he’s put up behind his eyes come down. 

“When you’re gone, you’re not really,” he tells you, giving your hand an affectionate squeeze. “Everything and everyone reminds me of you.”

“Really?” you say, your eyes gleaming. “I don’t know why but while we were gone… well, we received a video of you guys. The girls were really worried about what their guys were doing in it and… well, you weren’t in it. I was bricking it. I didn’t know what you were up to or if you found someone better.” You shake your head. “Sorry. I guess I just have trust issues. I try not to talk about it, but my ex cheated on me with my best friend. I found out when I was putting my flat up in the paper so I could move in with him. He kept asking me to give him a second chance, but I…” You take a deep breath and look at the bushes, suddenly aware of the cameras. “He said that if I loved him, what he did wouldn’t matter. He kept asking me if I loved him over and over again. I said I did and he said it was enough. He said there was hope.”

Bobby’s heart pinches at the thought that he might someday put you in a similar position. He shakes it, giving you an earnest look.

“You shouldn’t ever have to settle for someone just because you love them,” he tells you, squeezing your hand. He pulls you into a tight embrace and kisses your head. “You deserve the best. Never less.”

He tries to ignore the fact you fit perfectly in his arms. He tries to ignore the fact the end of the summer is looming, and the fact this moment cannot last. He tries to ignore the fact he’s most likely just given you the ammunition to leave him behind, because he’s not what you deserve. He pushes it all aside, honest with himself for the first time this summer. 

He’s broken his one rule and let you know him. You see him. He’s not prepared to lose you just yet. The words get stuck in his throat when he goes to say it, but he feels them vividly on the beat of his heart.

Bobby loves you. But love doesn’t save the shop. Love doesn’t fix the roof. Love doesn’t give his sister a future. Love, simply put, was not enough. But for a moment, he pretends it is. He pretends there are no cameras, no bills, no finale on the horizon. Just the two of you in a world where love is enough.

~~~~~

_Are you nervous?_

You’ve heard the question a dozen times tonight, and answered it the same way without a moment of hesitation. You were beginning to wonder if you should feel more nervous, but truly, honestly, you couldn’t force the feeling. Not knowing that whatever happens, you’ve won the show in the only way that really matters. 

Pulling your hair into a loose pony, you notice a smitten smile playing at your lips. A knock on the dressing room door turns your attention to a lopsided grin and glowing amber eyes. 

“Knock knock,” Bobby says, inviting himself into the room to give you a light peck on the cheek. You raise your eyebrows and smile at him.

“Saving the big smacker for the cameras?” 

He doesn’t respond, which instills the first lick of stress in you. 

“I’ve got to go brush my teeth,” he says, a sly smile on his face, which you know full well precedes a joke he thinks is killer. “I can _taste_ that fifty grand, MC.”

You laugh, rolling your eyes and giving him a playful slap on the chest. “Go on, you. You shouldn’t see me before I’m ready - it’s bad luck or something.”

“Whatever you say,” he says, his eyes twinkling. The spark in his eyes is beautiful… but there’s something eerie about the air between you right now. A gap you can’t explain. “See you on stage!”

No pet name. No compliments. No kiss.

You try not to dwell on it, trying to upend your fears by replaying your last date with Bobby. You swim in your memories of him mentioning grandchildren, moving in together, meeting your family… Things are solid. They’re heading somewhere. He was a blessing you couldn’t have imagined basking in before you met him. He was almost too good to be true, but time and time again he had proved he was. 

_Are you nervous?_

This time, the question comes from you. The answer has changed however. You’re bricking it, for reasons you now comprehend as complete hogwash. Pet names, compliments, kisses… they seem so small.

You emerge from the dressing room, charged by a spanking new sense of composure. You saunter up to Bobby and slip your hand into his. 

“Whatever happens, I think we won in the only way that really matters,” you tell him. The look he gives you is blank, but for mere seconds you can see a breath of guilt. He’s saved from responding when your phone sounds off.

_Bobby and MC. Congratulations. You are the winners of this year’s Love Island! Please exit the Villa to meet the crowd!_

The exhilaration you feel in that moment is unmatched. You turn to Bobby, who avoids your eye. You’re not sure how to handle his cold shoulder, so you choose not to question it. A knot starts to tie in the pit of your stomach.

“Are you okay?” You furrow your brows at him. “We just won Love Island. You don’t have your winning smile on.” You nudge him with your shoulder, trying to tempt a smile out of him. He manages a tight lipped one, but it drops quickly.

Hand in hand, you exit the Villa, met immediately with the enthusiastic smiles and deafening cheers of friends, fans, and family. Your heart fills with a certain gratitude for their endless support. For a moment, all feels right in your world.

Your phone chimes for the last time.

_Bobby and MC: for the past three weeks in the Love Island Villa, you have been put through challenges to test the strength of your relationship. Today is no different. To your left there are two podiums with two envelopes on them. One of them contains the cash prize. One of them is empty. Please each select an envelope._

You both stride over to the ones closest to yourselves and share one last look. You’re surprised to find you’re actually nervous about this. You silence your fears, reminding yourself that it doesn’t matter which envelope you end up with. You’re going home together. You’re sure of it.

“Same time?” Bobby says, his brows raised at you. The ever present smile on his face is different this time. It’s sort of sad.

“Same time.”

You and Bobby tear open the golden envelopes at the exact same time. You tug the blank piece of paper out and hold it up for Bobby to see, an amused smile stretched across your face. Bobby stares at the winning cheque in his hand. On it, £50,000 is scrawled in pink ink. He doesn’t look up right away.

_Bobby, the decision is yours. Would you like to split the money with your partner or keep all £50,000 to yourself?_

In the distance, a pin drops. Bobby looks at you, then back to the card in his hand. He glances over at his shoulder, catching sad and tired eyes with his mother in the crowd. He glances at you one last time, then back at the card.

He then does the last thing you thought he would have ever done to you. The last thing you would have ever done to him.

“I’m going to keep it.” 

You chuckle involuntarily, nervously glancing toward the audience as you wait for him to say he’s joking.

He doesn’t.

You raise your eyebrows at him. “Excuse me?” You wince at the frail sound of your own voice. You’re asking him to explain it, not to repeat it. He still does.

“I’m keeping it,” Bobby says again, plunging the knife into a deeper cut.

“I heard you,” you say back. He flinches slightly at the cold whip that is your tone of utter disgust and betrayal. “I want to know why.”

“Look, it’s nothing personal,” he tells you with an earnest that you throw away just as carelessly as he’s thrown away your entire summer. The nerve of claiming that it wasn’t personal. The absolute gall of it all. You feel your arms prickling with a mucky combination of hurt and confusion. 

_You said you loved me._

Head spinning, you throw the footage rolling on the screen above your heads back at him. “You talked about our grandchildren, Bobby. You asked me to move in with you. But suddenly, when £50,000 is ion the line, it’s not personal.”

“I’ll explain it to you in private,” he says, trying to keep his voice low, as if he’s just now noticed the hundreds of cameras on them right now. “I don’t really want to air it out for the whole world to see.”

He struggles to meet your eye, giving you a pleading look that can’t help but feel impersonal.

You laugh bitterly, gesturing to the crowd of people watching your fallout in real time. The sea of mortified faces, including your friends and family all stare at you, curiously anticipating what would, without a doubt, be dubbed an overreaction later on. Humiliation washes over you. You’ve had your broken heart immortalized in film forever now. You weren’t even granted the luxury of a private estrangement, and he has the valor to ask you to be offended off-screen.

“What’s the point, Bobby?” His name tastes like venom on your tongue. The bounce of it on your lips sends a chill down your spine, but this time it’s not so pleasant. The trust and love he once embodied is twisted, conformed. You can’t even fully make out what you feel for him anymore, only that it’s different. “You - Don’t you think you owe me an explanation of some kind?” 

He doesn’t respond. The paparazzi makes the most of this raw moment of weakness, which is a pleasure you never would have imagined allowing them. You can’t concentrate on tomorrow’s headlines when you’re busy living them.

“I never meant to lead you on,” Bobby stammers, stumbles and falls over his own words. 

“Give the puppy dog act a _rest_ , won’t you?” you cry, growing too aware of the hot tears on your face. You push your fingers against your scalp in frustration. “You said you _loved_ me. You planned a future with me.” You gesture toward the highlights reel. “You can’t say that, not when there’s footage as real as this moment to prove you went a step above leading me on, Bobby.”

You’ve rendered him speechless - not that he had much to say for himself before, but he looks thoughtful and guilty, which makes being angry with him so much harder. He’s no monster. He’s just a coward.

“If I had opened the envelope I would have split it with you, no question.” The look you give him is dripping in a dishonest cruelty. You search his face for answers. You want to know why he would double-cross you like this, because he’s fallen far too silent to be a malevolent bastard. There’s a reason, but coaxing them out of him was a task you were too emotional to take on right now. “Then this never would have happened. We’d just keep living a lie, right? Just £25,000 poorer.”

Bobby’s head is the only thing louder than you at that moment. His tongue twists, trying to decide whether he should let you stand here, raising reasonable hell for him, utterly humiliated by his decision with no explanation or commit the same crime at his family’s expense. Neither is appealing. Neither is easy. He glances at his mother, who looks at him with those same tired eyes, but they’re tainted with disappointment.

All sound and color drains out of the world. He had convinced himself he had been doing nothing but an odd job for his family’s sake - a noble cause, even heroic, that cancels out the cruelty of leading you on. It was as simple as keeping you pleased in the Villa, so that he could leave with the money and finally make his family happy. 

But then it hits him.

They’re _not_ happy about the cash. You’re not happy. He’s not happy. At the end of the day, he failed at the one thing he ever wanted to do. A wave of guilt comes over him. 

This was never an odd job to you. This was _real_. There were _real_ emotions involved. As much as it pains him to admit, it was true for both parties. And if by making you look like a mug in front of the whole world, he was going to be letting his family down, his entire mission was moot. 

Bobby stares back at you, his expression blank. Your fury is righteous and he knows that. He wonders briefly if he can backtrack and tell them he’s decided to split it. But it’s not about having more or less money for either one of you. He’s lost in the only way that really matters.

“Say something!” you tell him.

Bobby takes a step toward you, surrendering his poker face for the first time since your chat on the roof after Casa Amor. The vulnerability in his eyes is so strong, you stagger backwards when you register it.

“I’m sorry.”

You can’t even put on an uncaring mask. You don’t understand his decision, and his breach of trust has only fortified the walls you were ready to let down for him. But you feel this sense of sympathetic nature that connects with his brokenness.

If your love was enough, you would have taken him back.

But you flash back to his advice from that night on the roof: “You shouldn’t ever have to settle for someone just because you love them.”

You’re met with two different Bobbies in your head. One of them begging for another chance and the other telling you to tell Bobby you deserve better. And when it comes down to it, you will always love the Bobby you thought you knew. He was kind, gentle and selfless. He would have never expected you to pick him over you. And whether he was ever real underneath this conniving game-player standing in front of you, you owed him the honor of living vicariously through you today.

For _his_ sake, you shake your head.

“So am I.”

And for your own, you walk away.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed! Don't forget to leave kudos or comments if you feel so obliged.


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